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From: boyajian@akov68.DEC (JERRY BOYAJIAN)
Newsgroups: net.comics
Subject: re: Kirby's creations
Message-ID: <709@decwrl.DEC.COM>
Date: Sat, 25-Jan-86 11:46:28 EST
Article-I.D.: decwrl.709
Posted: Sat Jan 25 11:46:28 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 26-Jan-86 06:01:00 EST
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> From:	fluke!moriarty	(Jeff Meyer)

> ...Kathy's suggestion
> is interesting; I don't know how legally sound Kirby's claims are to the
> characters (morally, I think he's what Mr. A would call "without a speck of
> black"), but it is an interesting proposition.  However, if Kirby were to
> win, which characters would he take with him?  First, CBG said that only
> Kirby was going after character rights (and that Marvel is saying that this
> voids his rights to the original artwork -- the shitheels!); Stan says he
> doesn't want to pursue it, and Ditko signed the rights away a couple of
> years ago.  So basically this means FF, Silver Surfer, Inhumans, scads of
> villains, the Avengers(?), Thor(?), and many others would go.  Still, not
> the entire Marvel Universe (I don't think the X-Men would leave -- that was
> Lee and someone else).  Also, how many issues of a comic would Kirby have
> had to do to get rights?  Does he have to be the "creator" (issue #1)?  In
> that case, he really does have the majority of the old-liners, especially
> Captain America.

As I said before, I don't believe that Kirby can sue for complete ownership
of the characters, only co-ownership with Marvel. As for what characters he
would "get", I would think that they'd be any characters that he created/
designed, which would give him most of the early Marvel characters. He was
responsible for creating/designing (at least partially, with Stan Lee):
FF, Spider-Man, the Hulk, Captain America, Thor, Ant-Man, The Avengers,
Doctor Doom, The X-Men, and so on. About the only early "Marvel Age" character
I don't think he had any hand in at all is Doctor Strange. Even though Ditko
was the original artist on Spider-Man, I believe that Kirby worked with Lee
to design the character.
	As for the X-Men, Kirby did indeed do the pencils on the first
dozen-or-so issues and layouts for the next half-dozen-or-so (with pencils
by Werner Roth as "Jay Gavin").

When someone says that "without Kirby, there would *be* no Marvel Universe,"
he ain't just-a spittin' inta the wind.

--- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian, DEC, Acton-Nagog, MA)

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